Young X-Men #1Review

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The last generation of mutants attempt to live Xavier's dream.

By Bryan Joel

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If you're just joining, Young X-Men is a direct evolution of New X-Men, a title that focused on the "last" generation of teenaged mutants. The book was quietly cancelled during "Messiah Complex" and its cast presumably scattered when the X-Men disbanded. Enter Cyclops, getting the band back together under the banner of "Divided We Stand" (or, if you'd rather, "The Further Shade-ficiation of Scott Summers"). Except, unfortunately, it's not quite that simple.

The first issue of Young X-Men should reasonably answer the following questions: 1) Where is the cast of New X-Men?, and 2) Why should this book exist in its place? As far as the question #1 goes, the only answers come in the form of "vets" Dust and Rockslide. And as for question #2, well, your guess is as good as mine. Frustratingly, there's no sign of a mission statement within these pages. Cyclops has disbanded the X-Men, so his next logical step is to scoop up some amateur mutants from prison, or while they're selflessly defending small Middle Eastern cities, and make a team? Erm...? The book seems to exist on the strength of the idea that these kind of X-Men, Jr. teams usually sell well enough, so why not? The notion that it's sort of ridiculous to have a team running around calling itself the Young X-Men without the existence of a (Mature?) X-Men isn't touched upon, and that makes it even more painfully evident.

To make matters worse, the character choices are severely questionable. As one might expect, the two holdovers from the old book are the clear standouts. Dust and Rockslide have more history to draw from, allowing Guggenheim to have them do more than stand around and be recruited. The rest of the lineup is a mixed bag. I'm not sure it was a stroke of genius to include (and then sexualize) Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men creation Blindfold, as the script doesn't seem to be completely comfortable with her idiosyncratic speech patterns and she ends up sounding more like Gollum from Lord of the Rings. (And truthfully, even if done right, that schtick will get very tired in the long-term). Newcomer Ink is a total mess of a character; at this point, the less said about him, the better. Couple it all with Guggenheim's sudden penchant for borderline unbearable dialogue, and it's not a pretty picture.

It's all a bit of a letdown in light of the fact that New X-Men was veering dangerously close to having a workable cast with noticeable synergy. There was fat to be trimmed, to be sure, but why Ink or Wolf Cub got the nod to join the Young X-Men over a number of better-qualified candidates from the potential character pool like Anole, Hellion, Armor, or Mercury is beyond me. Instead, all the work already put into the "last generation of mutants" in New X-Men is effectively dumped for this new iteration. I'm not exactly salivating at the prospect of watching this new lineup retread the same territory that its predecessor did growing into a functioning team.

Not an auspicious start to the series, really. The other two book spinning out of "Messiah Complex," X-Force and Cable, may not be the greatest titles on the stands, but they at least make a case for their own existence. Young X-Men has a long way to go in that respect.